While some people are stereotyped with their choices of music, a recent study just discovered the positive correlation between the levels of empathy and preferred music genres.
Yahoo Health reports a study entitled Musical Preferences Are Linked to Cognitive Styles explains the link between a person's "style" of thinking to his or her musical taste. According to the study's authors, people are classified into two cognitive styles: an empathetic and a systemizer.
"Although people's music choices fluctuates over time, we've discovered a person's empathy levels and thinking style predicts what kind of music they like," said study's co-author, PhD student David Greenberg. "In fact, their cognitive style -- whether they're strong on empathy or strong on systems -- can be a better predictor of what music they like than their personality."
Greenberg, who's also a trained jazz saxophonist, describes each of these cognitive styles by imagining two people standing on top of the mountain: The person who is in awe by the view and more likely to discuss the beautiful scenery is empathetic. The other one who is more likely to talk about tectonic plates and how long the mountain exists is called a systemizer.
According to their study, the empathetics or those who scored high in Emotional Quotient (EQ) tests prefer music in the "Mellow dimension," while systemizers or those who had high scores in Systemizing Quotient-Revised (SQ-R) tests prefer music in the "Intense dimension."
Music genres under the Mellow dimension include R&B/Soul, soft rock and jazz to name a few. Empathetics, they say, like low arousal sounds with emotional depth in lyrics.
Meanwhile, heavy metal, punk, and hard rock belong to the Intense dimention bracket. Systemizers, who like to listen to these types of music, prefer high arousal sounds and cerebral depth in lyrics.
"This line of research highlights how music is a mirror of the self," said study's lead author Dr. Jason Rentfrow. "Music is an expression of who we are emotionally, socially, and cognitively."
Find out your cognitive style by visiting their website The Musical Universe.
